This is my response to an article that I read in which Chinese officials were mocking the West and US because they “claim” to be nearly unaffected by the global financial crisis. They are claiming that this proves that their model, totalitarin communism, is superior.

What a joke, the only reason that China “appears” to be weathering the financial storm is because they still have 800 million slaves to force to provide a workforce at practically no cost. It’s a problem in the US and Europe now because the people not on welfare, meaning those of us who actually work, expect a payback based on the amount and complexity of the work we do. Quite simply, we have reached the point where the welfare benefits enable a life that is too close to the average worker’s lifestyle and we are not willing to give more so that nonworkers can live even better AND we have reached the critical point where what is produced by the ever decreasing numbers of workers is getting close to not being enough to support the ever growing numbers living for free. This is and always will be the achilles heal of socialism. China survives because they can literally starve or work 800 million people to death. I saw not long ago your typical Chinese peasant thrilling over the new technology in his home; he has a pit under his house that he shovels the pig and chicken manure into, it composts into methane gas which he could use by opening a valve to start a cooking fire. So, the choice is simple: we can all either live over our dung pits and be poor serfs toiling for the chosen few who get to live rich; or, we can go back to expecting people to actually contribute to society by working and producing a service or product to earn the credit on which they live.

The crux of socialism is the welfare creep; there will always be workers who are living just enough above the standard of living offered to those not working, that they see no point in working harder or at all. The system is continuously stressed by this tipping-point, and the point creeps upward until it is unsustainable. Ever growing numbers of nonworking voters are increasingly able to put more and more representatives in place who maintain their own elite status and power by providing better handouts. And, as the handouts get better more workers drop-out for the easy life. Add to the mix politcal systems that allow nontaxpayers to vote on new taxes and you are doomed. What person would not vote for a new park, better public services, etc when they will not have to personally pay for it? And so the burden on the dwindling working class grows ever more until the government can only sustain the system through either progressively exerting more authority over the workers to force them to produce more for less payback and/or debt-spending to pay for increasing benefits to non-workers. The spiral continues until the government has totalitarian authority and the produced resources can no longer sustain the debt, and in the end there is no freedom and the authorities can reduce the handouts for everyone else to maintain their own rich lifestyles with the meager resources still being produced.

Back to China, they seem to be weathering this financial crisis because they have already stripped their workers of all rights and can work them harder, they can pollute the workers’ communities with toxic waste with no repercussions, and they can force them to live a more austere and less resource-consuming lifestyle to maintain the elite’s lavish lives. BUT, inevitably they will poison their lands enough and kill enough of their workers that their system will collapse either because there are no longer enough resources for any of them to survive or because the remaining workers will finally throw out the elite. In either case the remaining resources capable of being produced in a toxic countryside will be so little that any survivors will be living very meagerly as the system reboots into everyone again being measured by their direct work and contribution.

We on the otherhand have a chance to avoid our progression toward complete collapse; we can stop the cycle of a more authoritarian government and its increasing deficit spending to provide ever-better handouts to noncontributing members of society in exchange for their votes. We can start moving back to where your means of living are based on the amount and complexity of the work that you do, and ONLY communally support those who are truly incapable of self-support due to disability or disaster and those who have retired from a life of work but need a little help. That will, of course, mean that those who choose to work little, not learn a needed skill, or have more kids than they can afford WILL have to give up their flat screen TVs, free cell phones, and the other “benefits” that are beyond the basic necessities that the rest of us are currently working to provide for them

I often see Christians hassled over comments about not supporting increased “charity” to welfare recipients. They are told that they are bad Christians and that “Jesus would be ashamed.” Well, let us not forget:

1 Timothy 5:8: “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”

2 Thessalonians 3:11-12: We hear that some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the bread they eat.

The freedoms that all Americans enjoy, and often take for granted, have all been won and preserved by those who were willing to put their lives at risk and wear the uniform of the United States Army, Air Force, Navy, or Marine Corps. Countless families throughout our history and many today are torn asunder as loved ones have left for foreign soil to combat tyrants or otherwise protect American interests. Many families have forever lost their loved ones, who paid the ultimate price for freedom by being killed or lost in war.

These are the foremost Givers to our society, and nothing that we have today would exist without their sacrifices. My two favorite quotes regarding this subject follow, I hope you enjoy them.

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing …which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.” –John Stewart Mill

“It is the soldier, not the reporter, Who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, Who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the organizer, Who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, Who salutes the flag, Who serves beneath the flag, And whose coffin is draped by the flag, Who allows the protestor to burn the flag.” – Father Dennis Edward O’Brian, USMC